ACOUSTIC CORRELATES OF EMPHASIS IN ARABIC

The effects of emphasis, a secondary articulation in the posterior vocal tract, were investigated in the speech of 8 speakers of Jordanian Arabic. A number of acoustic parameters were measured in the consonants and vowels of mono- and bisyllabic minimal pairs containing plain or emphatic consonants in initial, medial, or final position. In general, the acoustic correlates of emphasis include a raised F1, lowered F2, and raised F3 in the vowel adjacent to the emphatic consonant. This pattern across the three formants suggests that emphasis involves a constriction near the epiglottis. In addition, the present results indicate that the spectral mean of the consonant itself is also a reliable acoustic correlate of emphasis. However, while the spread of emphasis can be detected throughout both vowels of bisyllabic words, only the target consonants themselves show an effect of emphasis.